Counterfeiting is a major issue in the retail industry. Most enterprises use ad hoc approaches such as using special pens to mark bills or holding the bills up to a light for inspection. Moreover, most enterprises only check bills of high denominations, such as $50, $100 or passports.
Counterfeiters are growing smarter to the techniques and procedures of stores and will pass a larger number of smaller bills that they know are not likely to be checked. The counterfeiters may also only frequent a store once or twice before moving on to pass bad bills at different locations sometimes far away from the initial store where bad bills were passed.
When a store attempts to deposit counterfeit bills with its bank, the counterfeits are discovered resulting in a loss of funds to the store. Counterfeit bills are theft to a store and very costly and such costs are generally passed on to the consumers in terms of higher item prices.
Furthermore, some store clerks may do a poor job of checking for counterfeits during high traffic times at the store. In fact, some times the clerk may not check at all. Diligent clerks that check excessively well may anger loyal customers that are waiting to checkout during high line queue waits. This can cause a store to lose a valuable customer with dissatisfaction.
Therefore, there is a need for more efficient currency validation at a retail checkout.